Frederick Sommer
[Photographer, b. 1905, Angri, Italy, d. 1999, Prescott, Arizona.]
I could take a cow and implant a camera in it and let it amble around the city or in its own domain (I say a cow because a human being I would not trust). If the camera was programmed to go off at an indeterminate series of moments, the samplings would be fantastic.
Larry Sultan
[Photographer, b. 1946, Brooklyn, New York, d. 2009, Greenbrae, California.]
…the more you try to control the world the less magic you get. It’s really about being open and surprised.
Harry Callahan
[Photographer, b. 1912, Detroit, Michigan, d. 1999, Atlanta, Georgia.]
I sort of believe that a picture is like a prayer; you’re offering a prayer to get something, and in a sense it’s like a gift of God because you have practically no control—at least I don’t.
John Waters
[Filmmaker and photographer, b. 1946, Baltimore, Maryland, lives in Baltimore.]
The way I photograph... in many ways it’s directed by chance and all my mistakes, which are often the best stuff. I found that no matter if it’s the same tape, the same TV, and the same camera, I can never duplicate an image... your arm jiggles, there’s just too much chance. And I never put it on pause, or use any of that fancy equipment.
Bill Brandt
[Photographer, b. 1904, Hamburg, Germany, d. 1983, London.]
A photographer must be prepared to catch and hold onto those elements which give distinction to the subject or lend it atmosphere. They are often momentary, chance-sent things...
Robert Adams
[Photographer and writer, b. 1937, Orange, New Jersey, lives in Astoria, Oregon.]
When photographers get beyond copying the achievements of others, or just repeating their own accidental first successes, they learn that they do not know where in the world they will find pictures. Nobody does.
Joel-Peter Witkin
[Photographer, b. 1939, Brooklyn, New York, lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico.]
I believe in building photographs. I don’t like the unpredictable—I have a clear idea of what I want long before I click the shutter.
Beaumont Newhall
[Photographer, writer, and historian, b. 1908, Lynn, Massachusetts, d. 1993, Santa Fe, New Mexico.]
It is peculiar to photography that, by the extreme ease of its production, many accidentally interesting photographs are produced.
